The present invention generally relates to a method and system which supports multiple transport technologies. In particular, the present invention is directed towards a method and system for discovering and selecting access points for communication devices within a heterogeneous access environment.
In order to communicate with another party, a communication device, a communication network and a point of access to the communication network are required. In traditional telecommunication networks, there has been mainly one possible access method to a network at any given point in space-time. FIG. 1A illustrates a communication device, a point of access and a communication network. In FIG. 1A a landline telephone 105 is a communication device which connects to the public switched telephone network 115 via a wall jack 110. Although FIG. 1A illustrates wall jack 110 as a point of access to the communication network, it will be recognized that the wall jack 110 may be connected, in the building in which the telephone 105 is located, to a junction box where a telephone companies' trunk lines connect the building to the PSTN 115.
Even if there were several accesses point possibilities, conventionally a communication device was tied to a single access mechanism only. In other words, in conventional communication networks the access and transport network, e.g., the transport technology (i.e., technology carrying information between nodes), and the service provider network were tied together. For example, in a public switched telephone network (PSTN) system, a telephone is tied by a fixed access line, e.g., using twisted pair wiring, to the PSTN network. Similarly, a GSM mobile phone is traditionally tied to the wireless network through a GSM air interface.
Ongoing developments have been made to separate the transport technology from the access technology. Similar to the Internet technology, separation between application and access transports (included in the “link” layer) are progressively being applied in telecommunication systems. For example, in the IP-based communication networks a layering approach can be implemented in which the application implementing the user service such as ‘telephony’ is separated from the transport technology, including the access. In addition, it is currently possible for a communication device to support several access technologies. For example, a communication device can be connected to one or more networks using several access technologies simultaneously, e.g. cellular and short-range radio, such as Bluetooth or HiperLan.
FIG. 1B illustrates another communication device, point of access and communication network. In FIG. 1B there is a single communication device 120 in the form of a mobile radio telephone. The mobile radio telephone 120 normally connects to a mobile radio network via a long range access point. For example, the radio telephone may connect to one of the three access points shown in the dashed line 160, which includes a base station 125, a satellite dish 126, and a satellite station 127. For simplicity purposes, we will assume that the mobile radio telephone 120 is connected to the mobile radio network via long range access point 125, the base station. The base station 125 is connected to a communication transport network 130, such as, GSM network, a wideband CDMA network (WCMDA), a GSM 2000 network, a PDC or a D-AMPS network. The entire area of FIG. 1B, shown here as area 150, illustrates the operational range of long range access point 125
Also illustrated in FIG. 1B, is a short range access point 135 connected to another communication transport network 140. By connecting to a network via some access, an individual, or a machine, can communicate with other people, or with other machines such as Web servers. Dashed line 145 illustrates the operational range of the short range access point 135. It will be recognized that the transport networks illustrated may comprise one or more transport networks between a sending and a receiving communication device. If more than one transport network is involved a gateway between the transport networks may be required.
As illustrated in FIG. 1B, mobile radio telephone 120 normally communicates using the base station 125 as an access point to the network 130. However, the mobile radio telephone 120 may also contain the functionality to communicate with the network 140 using short range access point 135. As illustrated by the dashed line 145 surrounding the mobile radio telephone 120 and the short range access point 135, and by the area 150 surrounding base station 125 and mobile radio telephone 120, the mobile radio may be within the operational range of two different access points, i.e., short range access point 135 and long range access point 125. However, currently there are no provisions for aiding a user of a communication device in the selection of access technologies. For example, the user of mobile radio telephone 120 must manually select the type of access technology to be used, i.e., the GSM air interface with long range access point 125 or, for example, a HiperLan air interface with short range access point 135. In particular, there is currently no mechanism for providing information to a user or to a communication device which would aid in the decision of how to efficiently use different access technologies, including how to position the communication device to achieve an optimal orientation with respect to an access point.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to gather information about available access possibilities in every given point of space down to parts of meters and to map the position of user and/or communication device. Further, it would be desirable to provide an analysis of how the access alternatives map to the requirements of the application on the transport, taking user preferences on matters such as cost into account. In addition, it would be desirable to distribute and present the information to application(s) and the user including a recommendation on user action.